Welcome to the sacred ritual of the Kometa fish. We come to the table as strangers, but upon leaving, may we find ourselves as friends, not foes.
Uh, is there a third thing we could find ourselves as?
Hey, don't cry. 5 Della Van Hise fics in PDF form, saved by the WayBack, all available for download ♡
DVH notoriously had her fics pulled from AO3 and she never uploaded them again. Outside of purchasing the zines she wrote for and created—and given her 14 confirmed pseuds, good luck tracking down everything—finding the odd scan of a zine online or the occasional working archived link from her AO3 is not easy.
(All of these works are linked on Fanlore on the fic's individual pages, but as it always goes with Fanlore, organization is not the best and DVH's main page links to an older version of her site before she offered these stories for free; this is to just get the awareness out and ramble on my blog about it, tiny though it is. As my friend put it went I sent these to her, "This is like Christmas in May!")
For those of us who can't afford to drop $40+ on a zine (average cost; we've all seen higher), lack the space for keeping old zines, or are afraid of opening the door of Buying All The Zines, may this find you well ♡
Front and back cover artwork from Hise's zine Styx and Stones.
Left image by Marilyn Cole, served as the inspiration for the fic Styx and Stones; Right image by Jackie Zoost
On Wings of Ice (1987)
"Stranded on a frozen planet when their shuttlecraft is sabotaged, Kirk and Spock share love as they wait for death." [More on Fanlore]; originally published in KSX #1
My 2 cents: I cried with this one and it was worth it. There's phrasing in this one that has me rending my garments.
Collaboration (1987)
"When Kirk points out that their relationship may have become complacent, he and Spock put their heads together to see what can be done to breathe life back into the bedroom. But of course, nothing is ever as straightforward as it seems… A twisted little K/S tale." [More on Fanlore]; originally published in Styx and Stones
My 2 cents: One part fic, one part meta about K/S and why fans create (yes, really! She pulled it off beautifully), all fluffy feelings.
Styx and Stones (1987)
"Spock awakens in a new land after dying and waits for Jim, who is in a coma following a shuttle crash." [More on Fanlore]; originally published in Styx and Stones
My 2 cents: I wish I knew what it was like to read this before On Wings of Ice. I'm not saying this was bad or boring - far from it! Hise used a lot of poetic creativity in her depictions - but my brain kept thinking back to On Wings of Ice and that does this story a disservice.
Someone to Watch Over Thee (1988)
"Spock, Kirk, and an ambassador are given aphrodisiacs by the leader of a hedonistic society and itʼs up to the security men to make sure they get who and what they need." [More on Fanlore]; originally published in Naked Times #18
CW: rape/noncon elements (your mileage my vary on this, however, I'm noting it out of an abundance of caution)
My 2 cents: it's Aliens Made Them Do It but told from the perspective of a Redshirt.
The Gol Letters (1988)
"Apart, Kirk and Spock each write letters to each other, each believing that the other will never read them." [More on Fanlore]; originally published in Naked Times #18
My 2 cents: I personally felt like a pumpkin with its innards scooped out but then became a ball of fluff. Heed that as you will.
More about DVH:
She's both a pillar of the fandom for her prolific work as the publisher and editor for the Pon Farr Press (and its many zines) and for her many works of poetry and fanfic, be they short stories, novellas, or novels. In the professional realm, Hise is perhaps best known for the (in)famous Killing Time. (Really, read the link for (in)famous. DVH certainly got screwed over by that contract, although highlight the text here and she's banking on the reputation of it, lol. DVH, I can never hate you. And peep the other link too for a surprise ♡)
She passed away on March 3, 2021 and is survived by her partner Natasha Solten. (Her AO3 for anyone who wants that directly. The bulk of her Star Trek fics are locked to registered users-only.)
Still dying. But in brighter news, the neighbor’s tree I thought I might have accidentally killed last year seems fine. PRAISE THE GODS I was on the edge of my seat all winter
Paramount can kiss my whole ass with this cancellation. I’m not fucking surprised considering the merger but man what a fucking blow. Starfleet Academy very quickly became one of my favorite series of new trek. Fuck off paramount, and during the 60th celebration too. I’m so mad rn
Nahla Ake swiftly became my favorite captain, right next to Janeway. This whole series was so fucking good
I wanted to see those cadets grow more, become officers, and move to rebuild after the burn. The fucking potential, man.
In Discovery, when Burnham is promoted to Captain at the end of season 3, she gets the fourth "pip" on her badge and new epaulets. When we see the full uniform, she also has four pips on her collar front piece. No rank under captain has any pips on the collar. In the 32nd century, for commanders and undrr rank appears to be badge only.
The duty uniforms from Discovery are reused for Starfleet Academy in places.
But there are new things. The standard instructors uniform and the coach uniform have no secondary rank indicators; rank remains on the badge. Per the concept art, they look like the ship, just with the pips on the wings.
I don't have a good screenshot of the Starfleet Academy badges that went into production, but they appear to be the same as the concept art.
But not everyone is wearing the instructor jacket with their "wings." Look at the Chancellor of the Academy: Captain Ake.
What's this? Captain Ake has her badge, and the same four-pip epaulets, and a split collar front piece(s), each side with four pips. Her second in command, her number one, Commader Lura Thok, also has a split front collar but each side only has a single pip.
So how does this make "Commander" Kelrec a captain? Let's take a look:
Four-pip epaulets? check. (They appear to be backwards: the right and left epaulets were reversed on his jacket.)
Four-pip split collar? Check.
Four-pip badge? Who can tell, we only have one to look at. The war college badge that he wears has a four-way symmetry with four "pips" separating the four braided sections surrounding the delta.
So where does that leave us? Is he a commander-chancellor wearing the wrong rank insignia? Or perhaps he's wearing insignia commensurate with his rank, but being addressed by the wrong title. We have a "commander" pip, per Thok, and he's not wearing it. I'd like to believe that it's more likely that the Chancellor of the War College is referred to as "Commander" for some reason, despite his rank of Captain. Perhaps "Commander" is simply a bastardized "Commandant" and it's tradition now.
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